


Negative Space

by Cerusee



Series: Batfam Week 2018 [1]
Category: Batman (Comics)
Genre: Bruce is sad, Gen, alfred is also sad, canon character death, hurt no comfort sorry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-29
Updated: 2018-07-29
Packaged: 2019-06-18 04:31:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,244
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15477723
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cerusee/pseuds/Cerusee
Summary: Bruce and Alfred are both grieving Jason’s loss, but not the same way, and not together.





	Negative Space

**Author's Note:**

> For the Batman 2018 event. Prompt: “Vacation or Separation”.

Bruce wanders the silent house.

The kitchen, first. This was often the first place Bruce would see him, in a calendar day. Hunched over the table, a studious look on his face, chewing the cap of his pen.

_Hey, Bruce?_

_“Jay?”_

_I can’t get the hang of this. Can you help me?_

Bruce bends over Jason’s shoulder. Intro to Organic Chemistry.

Jason hates it, Bruce knows. But chemistry was one of Bruce’s favorite subjects, and he’d spent months coaching Jason through the material.

_Maybe I’m too stupid!_

_“You can do this,”_ Bruce says, in his memory. _“Aren’t you Robin?”_

Jason had sworn at him after that, and disappeared for a few hours. Bruce had checked, and sure enough, there was another cigarette gone from Jason’s emergency, under-the-bed stash. Jason didn't like to advertise his infrequent stress-related relapses, and as long as they remained infrequent, Bruce thought it was better to let them go.

Jason had reappeared hours later, pale and puffy-eyed, and insisting on trying again.

They did. It didn’t go well. Jason had retreated in tears a second time. Bruce had made sure to check in with Jason at bedtime, and found him unhappy, but not unwilling.

“I’m going to get it,” Jason whispered, when Bruce was on his way out the door. He shifted and sat up. “I’m going to get it, Bruce.”

“I know, Jason,” Bruce said. “I made you Robin for a reason.”

Why had he said that?

Why had he ever—

The memory prompts Bruce to open his mouth, ready to let pearls of wisdom fall out.

But Jason isn’t here anymore. 

He was here, once. This is one of the places where Jason would be, where Bruce would find him.

The chair is empty. The room is empty, except for Bruce. He reaches out to that space where Jason is not, as if the act of reaching will materialize the boy, as if just _wanting_ will make it so. As if reaching can make it real, and there will be the warm and solid feel of Jason’s head under his hand, now, simply because he wants it so badly. The boy, subtly leaning back into the touch. Dick was touch-hungry; Jason was touch- _starved_. Dick could hug, frequently, easily. Jason would cling, and cry, and then run away for hours, to some safe hiding place.

_Jason_ , his heart wails, as his hand feels nothing. There is nothing but empty air. _Oh my God, Jason._

Bruce closes his mouth. 

The staircase from the great hall to the second landing is lined with photographs. _These will have to go_ , he thinks. He pulls them down from the walls, one by one, until his arms are clattering with the frames, until he has to shift and dance to keep them from falling. He takes them into Jason’s room, another place where Jason should be and is not, lays them on the neatly made bed.

Jason has— _had_ —left his German textbook open on his desk, next to a notebook filled with familiar handwriting. Bruce closes book and notebook up, places them back on the shelf. Nothing to remind him again of the boy who is not sitting in that chair.

He can’t bring himself to touch the clothes. Later, maybe, when it’s been long enough that any lingering scent of his son will have dissipated.

He closes the door behind him. The barrier is not enough, and Bruce feels the urge to board it all up. He doesn’t want to look at it, that room where Jason is _not_. The room where he will never be again. Never sleep again, never sit at his desk, or in the armchair, reading, sitting sideways with his legs thrown over the arm. Never get dressed again, or brush his teeth, or excitedly assemble a tuxedo for a formal event, and then come running out of his room to demand Bruce fix his ever-crooked bow tie.

_Never, never never._  
  
***

Alfred sits on the edge of the bed, and sifts through the pictures, carefully looking them over.

The first photograph is Jason and Bruce.

Jason is sitting at the table, looking up at Bruce who is standing over him, hands on his shoulders, and they are both smiling. There is nothing tentative about it; they both seem truly pleased. About _something_ ; Alfred cannot remember what. It was the first picture Alfred ever took of them together. Perhaps even on the first night. Or perhaps it was not until the second or third. Alfred had been a little taken aback at first when Bruce had brought home a second child and declared his intention of making him the new Robin, six months after Master Dick had departed the Manor for good. Mostly, he’d been surprised by how _certain_ of himself Bruce had seemed this time around.

There are no pictures of Robin, of course, not in this pile. Never in the Manor itself. Only in the Cave, on the wall dedicated to trophies and memorials, in private picture albums, carefully hidden away. But of Jason, just Jason—there are so many. Jason, delightedly holding up a history paper, emblazoned with with an _A+_. Jason, with the sign proclaiming the date of his finalized adoption, the smile on his face shy and almost disbelieving. Asleep on the couch in the library, limbs sprawling loose, mouth agape, an open book abandoned on his chest. In the photograph, Bruce stands behind the couch with a finger to his lips, draping a blanket over his sleeping son.

Alfred’s hand trembles as he picks up the next: a photo that Bruce had surreptitiously taken of Alfred and Jason in matching white aprons, heads bent over the kitchen island. Alfred had been showing Jason how to assemble the layers of a caprese salad—slices of ripe tomato overlapping with fresh mozzarella (purchased from a vendor at the farmer’s market and made that very day), and crisp basil leaves. Jason’s job had been to drizzle the salad with glossy olive oil, and as he focused on keeping his hands perfectly steady, the tip of his tongue had poked out of his mouth. Bruce had had the photograph professionally printed and framed, and had given it to Alfred as a Christmas present, later that year. 

It is Alfred’s favorite photograph of the boy.

He sets it to the side, and packs the others carefully in a box which he places on the floor of Jason’s closet. Alfred has already cleaned and put away the clothes left in the hamper—they may not stay in the closet, in the drawers; he may yet pack them away with mothballs, or donate them to charity. But he can’t bring himself to do it, not yet. So for now, they stay.

He takes the kitchen photograph for himself. He won’t force Master Bruce to look at it by putting it back in its original spot—Bruce might well take it down again if he does, and do worse this time than merely putting it out of sight—but he wants his own reminder of his grandson. The photograph goes into Alfred’s own room, a private sanctuary where other members of the house rarely intrude. He hangs it over his dresser, and underneath it, he lights a votive candle.

Alfred sits silent on the edge of his own bed, back bowed, elbows on his knees, chin resting on his folded hands, and watches the flickering light as the candle burns.


End file.
